The Jakarta Postreports on parallel U.S. and Chinese efforts to influence ASEAN:

As US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton wrapped up her mission in Jakarta to enhance ties with the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) and bolster the grouping’s role in the South China Sea spat, China pledged to give Cambodia US$500 million in loans and grants as a token of gratitude for Phnom Penh’s move in accommodating the Asian superpower’s interests in the region. Clinton concluded her state visit to Indonesia by making a courtesy call on President Susilo Bambang Yu-dhoyono and paying a visit to ASEAN headquarters in South Jakarta.

Even leaving aside Chinese efforts to keep the organization divided (at least on the South China Sea), Joshua Kurlantzick of the Council on Foreign Relations argues here that U.S. efforts to back the regional organization will be for naught if ASEAN members themselves don’t upgrade its diplomatic capacity:

But Secretary Clinton, or other American, Japanese, or Australian officials pushing and prodding ASEAN to develop a stronger organization, is likely to have little impact. The organization was designed to be relatively weak, by powerful, often autocratic leaders of the original ASEAN member states, who were highly reluctant to cede any ground to a regional organization. Today, however, many ASEAN leaders themselves are starting to realize that, for the organization to pull its weight in regional affairs, and to effectively defend members’ interests on critical issues like the South China Sea, ASEAN will require both greater unity and a more substantial Secretariat, led by a high-profile figure who can command world attention…

Jacac ta Globe 7/9

Insight: Asean Front & CenterA. Lin Neumann | September 07, 2012

It can still seem odd to think about, but Asean really matters these days. For much of its 45-year history, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations was an alliance that conjured images of sheer boredom and empty platitudes. Begun in 1967, as communist armies were nearing victory in Indochina, Asean started as an alliance of right-wing states that were part of a broad US-backed anti-communist front….

There are now three fairly open democracies — Indonesia, the Philippines and Thailand — while the rest are still basically authoritarian. But much has been accomplished….

until fairly recently, outsiders — most anyone who isn’t a diplomat, a regional businessperson or an employee of Asean itself — have tended to view the body as one big talk shop. The addition of the Asean Plus 3 and Asian Plus 6 frameworks for various summits has made Asean a cool place for bigger powers to sit down for serious chats, but in terms of the realpolitik of big power diplomacy, Asean has been fairly immune — a fact that has worked in favor of building quiet consensus. The current impasse over the South China Sea, however, has put the alliance at the center of one of the world’s most important big-power standoffs and given Indonesia an enormous task. US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, during a stop in Jakarta this week, called on Asean to demonstrate a “show of unity” in seeking a settlement with China, which has declared that it owns virtually the entire South China Sea. When she went to Beijing this week, the official press sharply criticized the United States for interfering and China stuck to its position that it would only negotiate one-on-one with individual nations. Potentially rich in oil and gas resources, bits of the sea are claimed by the Philippines, Vietnam, Brunei and Malaysia. In July in Phnom Penh, for the first time in the body’s history, Asean foreign ministers could not reach a consensus on a communique because of the issue. Some members, chiefly the Philippines and Vietnam, side with the United States; others, principally the current chair of Asean, Cambodia, are clearly backing Beijing, presumably in exchange for billions of dollars in aid and investment. If the issue is not resolved before the annual summit in November, work toward integration could grind to a halt. The alliance’s fragile unity is under serious assault. Senior diplomats in Jakarta see this as a major threat. But it is also a sure sign that Asean is no longer a club of insignificant nations whose leaders cross hands and grin at the camera once a year before disappearing into mind-numbing meetings. Asean is a player in major-power politics. To succeed the region must get its diplomatic act together and cope with Washington’s reassertion of influence in the region and China’s increasingly aggressive rise. The worry is that Asean lacks the diplomatic savvy to negotiate a way forward and keep its members from aligning with Beijing or Washington. So it has fallen on Indonesia to take the lead to repair the damage done in Phnom Penh. Most observers agree that Indonesia has by far the most capable Foreign Ministry personnel in Asean and a long tradition of leadership that dates back to the 1955 Asia-Africa Conference in Bandung. “Asean really counts now,” a senior Western diplomat said this week. “We have been trying to get people to take notice of that for years. Now that there is a real issue and the world is watching, I certainly hope they can get it done. “It is up to Indonesia. No other [Asean] country has the skills or the resources.” A. Lin Neumann is the host of the “Insight Indonesia” talk show on BeritaSatu TV and founding editor of the Jakarta Globe.

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CNN 7/9

Tại sao ASEAN vẫn yếu

By Joshua Kurlantzick, CFR

Editor’s Note: Joshua Kurlantzick is a fellow for Southeast Asia at the Council on Foreign Relations and author of ‘Charm Offensive: How China’s Soft Power Is Transforming the World’. This entry of Asia Unbound originally appeared here.

In her visit to Asia this week, including her trip to Jakarta on Monday, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has not only highlighted the renewed American focus on Southeast Asia, especially regarding the South China Sea, but also highlighted the rising importance of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), by visiting the organization’s headquarters, or secretariat, in Jakarta. At a bilateral meeting with ASEAN’s secretary general, Clinton remarked: “We [the United States] have an interest in strengthening ASEAN’s ability to address regional challenges in an effective, comprehensive way.”

When I speak of ASEAN, and the United States’ renewed interest, I do not necessarily mean the countries that encompass ASEAN, the ten nations in Southeast Asia. Washington has a renewed interest in the actual organization itself, and more clearly sees how ASEAN could play a larger role in managing regional integration. Compared to other regional organizations, not only in Europe but also in Africa and Latin America, ASEAN remains badly understaffed, with little ability to do its own independent research and analysis, and headed by a figure who, although sometimes capable (as in the current case), is given minimal powers and cannot compete on the global stage with leaders from the Southeast Asian nations themselves. The current ASEAN head, former Thai Foreign Minister Surin Pitsuwan, does not even attract the global attention that Singapore’s finance minister does, let alone the leaders of nations like Singapore and Indonesia.

But Secretary Clinton, or other American, Japanese, or Australian officials pushing and prodding ASEAN to develop a stronger organization, is likely to have little impact. The organization was designed to be relatively weak, by powerful, often autocratic leaders of the original ASEAN member states, who were highly reluctant to cede any ground to a regional organization.

Today, however, many ASEAN leaders themselves are starting to realize that, for the organization to pull its weight in regional affairs, and to effectively defend members’ interests on critical issues like the South China Sea, ASEAN will require both greater unity and a more substantial secretariat, led by a high-profile figure who can command world attention (say, former Singapore Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong, or former Thai Prime Minister Anand Panyarachun). This more recognized secretary general should then be given greater control of regional fiscal, security, and diplomatic affairs. The current ASEAN secretary-general, Surin, has long been known as a reformer pushing for a stronger secretariat. Following the collapse of the ASEAN meeting in Cambodia earlier this year, Surin admitted that ASEAN was failing and the organization needed to be stronger, with a stronger secretariat. For years, his voice was a relatively lonely one, echoed only by a few academics, and not by most of the leaders from critical ASEAN members like Singapore and Indonesia.

Now, that dynamic has begun to shift. Many leaders in Indonesia and Singapore, the two most important ASEAN members, have started to see the downside of a weak secretariat. For these nations, one option in the face of a weak secretariat would be simply to engage with other world powers bilaterally, or through other organizations like the G-20 or the Organization of Islamic Cooperation – a temptation both Indonesia and Singapore have indulged in. Yet as Indonesian diplomats have worked hard over the past three months to paper over ASEAN’s splits, and to move ASEAN nations toward a more effective common position on the South China Sea, Jakarta has increasingly realized that, instead of simply opting out of ASEAN, it can get what it wants – regional leadership – while also boosting a stronger secretariat. More than anything Secretary Clinton says, it is the decisions of the Indonesian leadership that will matter most.